Chapter 4
He was kissing her!
Simon Reeves, the man who broke her heart and left her to the gossips of St. Groves and the possible demise of her matrimonial
future, was kissing her.
Full on the mouth.
The warmth of his lips seared her fury. Heat unfurled from her stomach to scorch through her middle before racing back to
her cheeks.
Very full on the mouth. Warm and strong, his fingers kneading against her back in an almost desperate way.
And once the initial shock faded, two thoughts rose to prominence, jostling for dominance.
The first: She’d been entirely wrong about kissing scenes in her novels. Woefully, inexcusably wrong. How had she reduced
this—the strong, urgent heat of his lips, the solidity of his arms encircling her with such strength, the undercurrent of
tenderness in his touch—to mere words on a page? She’d overlooked the exhilarating aliveness of it all: the way his scent—a
tantalizing blend of leather, musk, and a trace of rosewood—ensnared her. She drew in a deeper breath, a strange sort of whimper
slipping from her in appreciation. Her entire body came alive with . . . feeling. And when his palm slid up her back, pressing
her to him? Heavens, she hadn’t expected to enjoy the sensation of being captured quite so much.
Her fingers twitched, curling into the rough fabric of his coat, just to give her time for a lengthier assessment. He tasted like lemonade—sour with an undercurrent of sweetness? She almost grinned at how close to the mark it fit his personality.
Or the personality she thought she’d known.
Which ushered in the second thought, striking her much harder than the first: How dare he? How dare he! Simon—Lord Ravenscross,
she reminded herself fiercely—was quite thoroughly completing his ruination of her reputation. And she’d already indulged
in his thorough ruination for much too long. His abandonment had been a betrayal sharp enough to cut, but this? To kiss her
now, as if her feelings and her reputation were his to toy with, was beyond the pale.
With all the strength her indignation could muster, she shoved him away.
The cool night air rushed between them, biting against her heated skin and pricking her eyes with traitorous tears.
The audacity. The sheer thoughtlessness and . . . meanness. She’d never expected him to stoop so low. Not the man she thought
she’d grown to know, but he’d proven her wrong in every particular once he’d left her standing alone on a veranda with a handful
of notorious witnesses and a crack in her heart.
“How . . . how could you?” Her voice, trembling and uneven, betrayed her fury even before her palm cracked against his face
with a force that startled even her.
Simon flinched, his hand flying up to his cheek as he stared at her, wide-eyed. Up close, his eyes were paler than she’d remembered,
their blue almost translucent under the moonlight.
“Didn’t you ruin me enough already?” she demanded, though her voice wavered.
His expression—a mix of shock and something more devastating—stole the edge from her anger. Why did he have to look so . . .
so lost? She pressed on. “Are you determined to destroy me entirely?”
He winced, as if her words struck harder than her palm, and his mouth parted as if to explain, though no words came immediately.
The burning in her eyes intensified.
“I . . . I never wanted to hurt you, Em . . . Miss Lockhart.”
The formality should have pleased her. But against every shred of common sense, its distance settled in her chest like a stone.
She shouldn’t wish for intimacy with him! Not after what he’d done, even if the look he currently was giving her—raw and impossibly
sincere—nearly had her reaching for a handkerchief to offer him. She hardened herself against the rush.
“Kissing me on a balcony at a very public ball certainly suggests otherwise.”
To her chagrin, saying it didn’t please her as much as it should have. In fact, she felt rather miserable.
“I . . . I was attempting to keep our location secret so that we wouldn’t be discovered.”
A weak excuse, and from the frown he made, he knew it.
He stepped back, raking a hand through his dark hair in a gesture that was far too casual for her liking. “I wanted to escape
my pursuers just as much as you wanted to escape yours.”
Emme instinctively shifted farther from the door, her movement betraying her unease.
His gaze flicked toward her, and a ghost of a smile tugged at the corner of his mouth—the kind she used to find maddeningly
charming. “You’ve always had a talent for disappearing at social events,” he murmured, his voice quieter now, carrying a thread
of something she couldn’t quite name.
Her gaze caught back in his, face warming more than it already was.
The words struck a nerve, dredging up memories she wasn’t prepared to confront.
Their first meeting had been during the height of Miss Willow’s debut ball, when the aforementioned lady had pursued him into the garden, only for him to trip—quite literally—into Emme’s hiding place behind a hedgerow.
She, of course, had been evading the boorish attentions of an inebriated Mr. Douglas Clyde.
For some reason, when he’d literally knocked her to the ground, Simon had refused to leave her side, despite her assurances
and a few scathing glances from Miss Willow. At the time, the last thing she’d wanted was the attention of the notorious flirt,
but one dance and conversation after another, Simon Reeves had begun to change in her eyes.
From stranger to one of the dearest men of her acquaintance.
Or had appeared to.
And then . . . he’d left without as much as a word of explanation.
For almost two years.
A man who could find his way into any number of drawing rooms, ballrooms, or gambling halls surely could have found a pen
and paper, could he not?
Her spine straightened, her resolve hardening. “Well,” she said, “in the future, would you be so kind as to locate your own
hiding spot and leave me and my”—her finger flicked toward her face, cheeks blazing—“lips alone?”
His brows shot up, and his gaze dipped to her lips, lingering there far too long. The tingling warmth that followed infuriated
and, to be perfectly honest, fascinated her.
“I’ve heard where you and your lips have been over the past two years and I’m not interested in . . . in . . .” Her face exploded
with warmth. What was she even saying? “The shared experience.”
Her words hung awkwardly in the air, and she tipped her gaze heavenward, silently rebuking her own ineptitude. She was far
better at these exchanges when they were confined to the pages of her manuscripts.
His attention shifted to her eyes, one brow arching higher than the other. “You’ve heard the rumors?”
She lifted her chin in defiance, refusing to envision the whispered tales of his exploits—Italy, Scotland, Ireland.
He tipped his head closer, studying her, his expression hardening a little. “And you believe them, do you?”
At the moment, answering seemed unwise, so she merely tipped her chin higher.
He took a deliberate step closer. “My elaborate escape to Italy with an exotic heiress, was it? Or Edinburgh, where I was
supposedly womanizing in the company of poets and philosophers?”
Her lips pressed together, but the words slipped out anyway. “And Ireland.”
At the darkening of his countenance, Emme wished she’d kept silent, but she’d raised her chin as high as it could go, so she
felt she needed to do something.
“Ah, yes. Ireland.” His laugh was short and humorless. “Why not add a voyage to the Americas while we’re at it? After all,
I’ve so much leisure time and coin to spare.”
Emme flinched a little at the fury lacing his words. Could the rumors about debt be true? She’d thought them inconsistent
with owning such an estate or traveling in such elegance—or was he trying to weaken her defenses?
“Why wouldn’t I prefer the wild and exotic over . . .” He trailed off, stepping closer, his gaze fixed on her with a ferocity
that stilled her breath.
“Over?” she whispered, her voice betraying her traitorous curiosity.
He didn’t answer. Instead, he moved closer still, the railing pressing into her back as he leaned in, their faces so near
that she could make out the tiniest golden flakes within the depths of his eyes. She didn’t push away. Didn’t wish to move.
All she wanted to know was the end of his sentence.
Could he have been talking about her?
And if he was, what did that mean?
His hands caught her arms, steadying her, and for a moment she thought he might kiss her again.
Air squeezed in her chest to the hurting spot. Something between the rumors and his behavior, her heart, and the evidence
of her own eyes didn’t fit together at all.
His gaze roamed over her face as if attempting to extract something she didn’t know how to give. Her breathing shallowed,
her mind warring with itself. Would he kiss her again? She tilted her head just a bit as if to prepare.
Research, after all, might justify another kiss . . .
Her cheeks warmed at the memory. And his closeness. And the idea that those rather impressive arms from his rather impressive
shoulders inspired a wonderful sense of safety she shouldn’t want from a scoundrel.
Yet the way he looked at her in the twilit night didn’t resemble anything like a scoundrel. For some reason she couldn’t quite
define, she wanted to touch his cheek and comfort him.
No! This was madness. Her reputation couldn’t withstand the blow.
As if he sensed her thoughts, Simon blinked, his head shaking slightly as though to clear it. He released her abruptly, stepping
back, his jaw tightening.
“No,” he said, his voice low and firm. “I have nothing to offer you, Miss Lockhart.”
His gaze trailed over her face once more, pausing a moment on her lips.
Her breath hitched.
“Perhaps once.” His frown deepened, and he released a sigh. “But a lot has happened since then.”
And with that, he turned and walked back into the house.